Surprising absolutely no-one, lol. Although Billie Piper coming back was a bit of a surprise. Not sure yet it it's a good one. Rose herself was fine, so if they can strip back the worship of her it should be ok.

Also, alternate theory: is Tennant back as the Doctor or as his regenerated-from-a-hand, half-human version? I can't see the point of that, but then I don't plot like Moffat and it's just the kind of twist that he'd love. It could also explain how Rose is back without just doing another timey-wimey thing.

 

I want the 10th Doctor, not his shitey copy.

 

At first I was sad. I thought: "Hey, this isn't good enough for a companion introduction!"

Then I remembered: Asylum of the Daleks was Clara's introduction.

I wasn't sad anymore.

 

Knowing Moffat, we'll probably get both. After all, this special is supposed to feature every single incarnation. Metacrisis!10 probably has enough Time Lord in him to qualify as being a 'Doctor'.

I can see it now. River does some timey-wimey wibbly-wobbly bullshit that chronologically pulls every version of the Doctor into the present, regardless of whatever important/not-so-important things they happened to be doing at the time. 1 is lecturing Susan. 2 is making funny gestures with his hands. 3 is Venusian Akido-ing someone, etc etc...

When 11 sees 10 materialize, he thinks that's the end... and then gets the shock of his life when Metacrisis!10 and Rose appear, snogging the life out of each other. Totally oblivious to what's just happened, they carry on, making all the other Doctors highly uncomfortable.

Comedy gold.

 

It makes me miss Hartnell, I would love to hear him sputter about, "what is the meaning of this?" then to have Metacrisis 10 say back "I don't discuss my personal life with strangers."

 

Just finished up watching The Rings of Akhaten. It was great. Coleman was fantastic, charming and clever. She really deserves the part because her talent is off the scale. She does the small scenes very well, and makes you just want to like her even more so for that.

Smith done well, I thought. The use of the

Spoiler

Sonic Screwdriver as a proper means of defence as well as a multi purpose tool for all budding Time Lords fulfilled the dreams I've had about it since Tennant's era. Hopefully this continues throughout the series but doesn't take precedence or become the usual fall back if one of The Doctor's schemes fail.

His monologue at the end, coupled with the music was really good as well.
Gave me shivers.
Better than the first episode by quite a bit, this one rates closer to a 3.5-4/5 for me.

 

Yeah. Rings of Akhaten was infinitely better than anything Moffat has written in the past two seasons. It was charming, thrilling, spacey, and just dramatic enough to not be overbearing.

Two big thumbs up to Neil Cross, Smith, and Coleman.

 

I dislike how they used the Sonic Screwdriver. I disliked the Doctor's pointless (if well acted) "I am a badass" scene.We geddit. I disliked the "wuv-wuv saves the day" tone. If I was twelve it might have been different. I'm not.

 

I'm of mixed feelings regarding the sonic. On the one hand, it was pretty cool seeing the Doctor fend off those random aliens with it. On the other hand, there needs to be some consistency with it, rather than as the plot demands. I highly doubt we'll be seeing him do that in any of the upcoming episodes. Assign some specific things to it, then think of something else to solve other problems.

On a more general note, another episode that, although possessing a bit more 'wow' factor than last weeks, probably isn't going to go down as an all-time classic. Lots of lovely moments*, but overall...I think basically just a bit rushed. There was enough stuff in there that they could have spun it into a two-parter, although you could probably say that about 90% of the show.

*Lovely moments:
The prologue, with Clara's parents. While it arguably detracted from the episode - because it took up a hell of a lot of time that could have been usefully devoted to the actual plot - it was emotionally engaging, well-acted and written, and a fantastic bit of development for Clara.

The Doctor's monologue. Because...well, just go watch it.

Clara's bit at the end, about not being a ghost. Lovely touch, and I'm glad we're (theoretically) not going to see a Martha re-run, although of course she doesn't know quite what it's all about.

Seeing a proper alien gathering. I think the episode holds the record for the highest amount of aliens on screen, at least within the show itself; I'm not sure if it beats, say, Star Trek.

 

What did you dislike about the Sonic Screwdriver? Consistency is a must, yeah.

The throwback to Classic Who made me smile. Good to see that it's not been forgotten. We don't always get direct references to it.

 

The screwdriver has always been a convenient tool. Using it as a straight up magic wand seems to be crossing the threshold. Holding doors open through force of will, somehow battling aliens with forcefields (aliens that were completely wasted and could have been an enemy in their own right) it just seemed silly and went overboard.

 

The door bit was definitely screwdriver overkill, but it was relatively obvious to me that the new aliens were emitting strong sonic waves from their mouths.



It at least makes a modicum of sense that he was able to repel/reflect it. Why did the showrunners think the waves needed a visual light effect? For the same reason the screwdriver lights up: cool factor.

Was it ultimately irrelevant to the plot? Yes. Yes it was.

 

See, the door was the bit I didn't mind so much; that's always been the main function of the screwdriver, as I understand it. Now that I think about it, I like your explanation of opposing sonic waves, so I'm going to give this episode a pass on that score.

On another note (pun not intended), I've seen the episode twice now, and I'm still a little confused on the whole ritual aspect. As far as I can see, there are a few possibilities.

A) The girl screwed it up, and so was sucked in as a last ditch attempt to keep the old god asleep.
B) It all went perfectly, and the whole point of the ritual is that she gets sacrificed in the end. In that case, you then have:
B.1) The girl had no idea this was going to happen, having been kept in the dark to get her to go along with it.
B.2) She knew it was going to happen, but had been persuaded to go along with it for reasons of duty etc.

I think it's definitely more B than A, going by the actions of the other chorister and the apparent purpose of the Vigil, but equally, the other chorister seemed to be genuinely shocked when it all went tits up at the end of her song. And the girl seemed to go from being surprised by everything that was happening to knowing all about it. The best explanation I can come up with is that various versions were written, and the final episode was edited together from bits of the different versions - it wouldn't be the first time editing has screwed the show over (see the pirates episode, where a side character just disappeared without comment). Either way, it's not a good thing.

 

According to ratings, Doctor Who is losing viewers fast; one million plus, so far.

Just don't think Smith cuts it as a Doctor.

 

How did you come to that conclusion?

 

It's true that around a million fewer people tuned in; it's also true that it still took nearly 30% of the total tv viewing for the night. It's even more true that those ratings don't take into account people watching it online/recording/repeats.

For context, an article detailing the drop in ratings between the series opener and the second episode - a drop of nearly a million viewers. It's actually an article from 2011, about series 6, but it's got nearly exactly the same figures, and also points out that with the non-live viewers added in, there was an increase of about three million. While I wouldn't claim to have a detailed break down of the shows ratings since it returned, it's a fairly standard pattern from what I can see.

 

That's disappointing. I had hoped that this half-season bullshit had come up bite them in the arse.

 

I was disappointed in the episode, to be honest. The good first, though: she setup was really cool, and the setting was one of the most alien that we've seen on Who for quite a while now, which I thought was fantastic. I didn't particularly have a problem with the cheesy alien costumes since it is Doctor Who; I'm not sure it'd feel right if it wasn't like that. The entire ritual felt like an alien experience for a bit, and I really liked that the Doctor was introducing Clara to an alien world by actually taking her to a completely alien place.

On the topic of Clara herself, I really like her. She works so well with Smith, and the character is interesting so far without being overly mysterious/Mary-Sueish(River Song, I'm looking at you). The scenes between her and the Queen of Years at the beginning of the episode were surprisingly strong.

All that said, things began to fall apart right about the time that the sonic screwdriver was apparently being used to channel the Force. I could buy the screwdriver opening the door because *science reasons* but I just can't seem to justify why the weight of the door would push down on it. Maybe that's just me not accepting Doctor Who's brand of fantasy, but I haven't felt anything rub me the wrong way like that in a few seasons.

The Vigil were scary and utterly wasted. The beginning scene with them, when the Queen is running, is set up to give us all new nightmares, and then they're just utterly underwhelming, because the Doctor is able to completely disregard them. Big disappointment.

The god in the end being a planet(nebula? was that a planet? I'm still confused about that) with a face was just dumb. Really dumb.

The Doctor is then given a pretty brilliant moment where he challenges the god to take in everything that he's ever experienced, because [impressive and awesome monologue]. I actually quite enjoyed the monologue, and thought that it was pretty moving, if hammy. I felt cheated, though, when it did absolutely nothing -- it just seemed like such a waste of a nice scene.

Oh. And in all the time since the beginning of the universe, nobody ever thought to feed this thing the could-have-beens of life? Really? That's... silly. Almost as silly as this episode.

The episode started strong, but took a nosedive toward the end. Hopefully tomorrow's is better!

Oh, and is it me, or has the cinematography dramatically improved in this second half of the season? I'm no expert on this sort of thing, but it certainly looks... different. Crisper, realer, something like that.

 

They keep inserting ways that Humans are amazing and unique. We get it. You don't need to keep telling us.

I'm looking forward to the 50th Anniversary just to see how epic it's purported to be.

 

That was a bit more like it. I wouldn't go so far as to say it's an all time classic episode, and it certainly didn't do anything particularly innovative with the formula, but it did everything well. Best episode of the three so far, and probably Mark Gatiss' best contribution to the show yet (the others being 'The Unquiet Dead', 'The Idiot's Lantern', 'Victory of the Daleks' and 'Night Terrors' [I think that's what it was called...the one where the Ponds got turned into dolls]).